Multiple states have enacted statutes to govern procedures when a state seeks to execute a person who may be incompetent to understand why s/he is being so punished, an area of the law that has always been riddled with confusion. The Supreme Court, in Panetti v. Quarterman, sought to clarify matters, ruling that a mentally ill defendant had a constitutional right to make a showing that his mental illness “obstruct[ed] a rational understanding of the State’s reason for his execution.”However, the first empirical studies of how Panetti has been interpreted in federal courts painted a dismal picture. Only a handful of defendants have ever been successful in federal courts in seeking to enforce the Panetti ruling, and the authors of this abstract have characterized the relief ostensibly offered by that case as nothing more than an “illusion” or a “mirage” in a federal context. The issues of believability of experts, allegations of malingering, and “synthetic competency” dominate these decisions.In this paper, we seek to expand this inquiry to determine (1) how defendants in state courts seeking to assert Panetti claims have fared, and (2) the extent to which state statutes have made any meaningful difference in the way such cases have been decided. We also investigate the significance of the fact that the caselaw in this area has totally ignored the teachings of the school of legal thought known as therapeutic jurisprudence and offer some conclusions and recommendations (based on therapeutic jurisprudence principles) that, if implemented, can (at least partially) ameliorate this situation.

中文翻译：

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“幻想之梦的永恒爆炸”：州法院如何无视最高法院在帕内蒂诉夸特曼一案中的判决

当一个州试图处决一个可能无能力理解为什么他/她受到如此惩罚的人时，多个州已经颁布了法规来管理程序，这是一个一直充满混乱的法律领域。最高法院，在帕内蒂诉夸特曼案，试图澄清问题，裁定患有精神疾病的被告享有宪法权利，可以证明他的精神疾病“阻碍了对国家处决他的理由的理性理解。”然而，第一个实证研究是关于如何帕内蒂联邦法院的解释描绘了一幅惨淡的景象。只有少数被告曾在联邦法院成功寻求执行该法案帕内蒂裁决，本文摘要的作者将该案表面上提供的救济描述为联邦背景下的“幻想”或“海市蜃楼”。专家的可信度、诈病指控和“综合能力”等问题主导着这些决定。在本文中，我们试图扩大这一调查，以确定（1）被告如何在州法院寻求主张帕内蒂索赔的进展情况，以及（2）州法规对此类案件的裁决方式产生任何有意义的影响的程度。我们还调查了这一领域的判例法完全忽视了被称为治疗法学的法律思想流派的教义这一事实的重要性，并提供了一些结论和建议（基于治疗法学原则），如果实施的话，可以（在至少部分地）改善这种情况。